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Student Ministry 2018

Psalm 17:13-15

¹³ Arise, O Lord! Confront him, subdue him!
    Deliver my soul from the wicked by your sword,
¹⁴ from men by your hand, O Lord,
    from men of the world whose portion is in this life.
You fill their womb with treasure;
    they are satisfied with children,
    and they leave their abundance to their infants.
¹⁵ As for me, I shall behold your face in righteousness;
    when I awake, I shall be satisfied with your likeness

Dear Church Family,
Recently my wife and I announced that we are expecting our first child! We could not be more excited. We have been wanting this for years, and we feel so blessed that the Lord has answered our prayers. We will find out in two months what the gender is, so for now we refer to him or her as “it,” or more affectionately, “Van Baby”. I never knew I could love an “it” as much as I do right now!

As we enter this new exciting phase of life, I desperately want to make sure we keep our priorities straight. This gift of a child certainly is a treasure from the Lord, and we rejoice in having this treasure bestowed on us. But I can already feel the temptation to love the gift over the Giver. I read this Psalm several weeks ago, and I realized that the culture that we live in is dead set on being like the people described in v14. Their children are more precious to them than silver and gold. They amass wealth in order to give to their precious ones. Their lives are spent polishing the shine on their tokens they call kids. And the Psalmist says this is wickedness.

I am afraid that, if we are honest, many of us in the church tend to lean this way as well. It is easy to do. It sounds right! Everyone in the country says these things, and to live on the contrary marks you as a bad person in the eyes of the world. But we do not live for the world. We do not love the world. We love God! For believers, our priorities must never shift from beholding and treasuring God in our hearts… not even for our children. We should, by all means, love and provide for our children. But the best thing I can give my unborn baby is a love and desire for the God who is currently making him or her, not my money or a “good life.” The only way I can pass that on to this child is to love the Lord with all my heart, soul, mind, and strength. Whether you are raising children or not, let us all strive to be like the Psalmist in v15! Let us find our ultimate satisfaction in the Lord. That way our precious ones will see how they too can be satisfied in life.

 Sincerely,
Brian Van Doren

Student Ministry April 2018

Dear Church Family,

This April the Student Ministry is going to Highland Lakes for our Student Retreat! This is going to be a great time of fun activities, friendship building, and spiritual growth! If you are a parent or grandparent of a student grades 6-12, I highly suggest you encourage them to come with us to experience what God has in store. Why do I say this? Well obviously, it’s because I’m the youth pastor and am supposed to say this… right? Wrong. I highly encourage this because students have no where else to turn to get the biblical teaching, friendships, and wholesome fun that we will experience on things like this retreat.

The retreat’s theme is “Consumed” because we are going to take a look at what consumes us and what we are consuming in life. The world that we live in is not interested in helping us live our lives to the fullest for the Lord. It is interested in telling us how to live for ourselves. The world does not want you to be careful about the content that you take in through your eyes and ears. It wants you to simply pay more money for what goes into your eyes and ears, and it will make any content for which you are willing to pay. The world does not want you to follow the God who has full authority over us. It wants individuals to be the final authority over themselves; essentially mini-gods who claim sovereignty to rule their own lives as they see fit. The world calls this autonomy, but God calls it idolatry. And the big question is: which do we consume, the teaching of the world or the teaching of the Lord? Seriously, which teaching goes into your eyes and ears the most? An even bigger question is: what consumes you, the Lord or yourself?

The world wants you to be so consumed with self that even doing good to others is about yourself. School, work,  family, leisure, even church is about self when we are consumed with and consuming the world. So how do we fix this? First, we need to ask if we really want to fix it. Why would we want life to be about something other than ourselves? The only reason that ultimately makes sense is that we have been saved by Jesus and have the Holy Spirit living in us, transforming us into the image of Christ. That’s because without Christ in us, we are lost sinners. But with Christ in us, we are transformed lovers of God and neighbor. He gives us new hearts and those new hearts are God and others focused. If you have Christ, then this is true of you. So, if you have Christ, then you want this self-centered tendency fixed. And how do we fix it now that we know we want to? We consume the gospel of Christ throughout the word of God! We put into our eyes and ears the gospel. We remind ourselves of the truth that the world so desperately wants us to forget. When the world says, “did God really say?” We say, “yes, He did! Because I was reading what He said just a little while ago, and I am consumed by the gospel!”

Students need so much these days, but what they need most is to be consumed by the word of Christ, Christ-honoring friends, Christ-honoring families, and a Christ-honoring church. Colossians 3 spells this out to us, and I am super excited to talk with the students about what that really looks like for them at their stage in life, as well as when they grow older. So, if you’re a student, come join us as we get consumed with a passion for the gospel of Christ lived out!

Sincerely,
Brian Van Doren